


Spirit-Touched World Building

by Thisisnotthenerdyouarelookingfor



Series: Spirit-Touched [2]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-29
Updated: 2020-10-17
Packaged: 2021-03-02 19:40:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,049
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24432241
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thisisnotthenerdyouarelookingfor/pseuds/Thisisnotthenerdyouarelookingfor
Summary: This is the world building and clarifications I have so far. It's also posted to my tumblr if you want to check that out.
Series: Spirit-Touched [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1764433
Comments: 12
Kudos: 106





	1. World-Building 1

Spirit-Touched World Building

The story itself is going to be mostly snippets of scenes because it’s not intended to have a fully fleshed out plot yet. This is all buildup. But for my own peace of mind, I’d like to get this out there.

Spirit-Touched is in a world in which the other powerful spirits take vessels once every couple hundred years. They can do this a couple of different ways: decision before birth, extenuating circumstances close to birth, and extreme trauma which enables entry. They usually do so out of sync, because too many powerful spirits taking mortal vessels tends to make for extreme changes. However, right now, that’s what they’re looking to do.

With this comes increased spirit presence in the world and as such, deeper spirituality and more people who can see and interact with spirits and the spirit world. These people tend to pop up every other generation or so, in order to have people to teach the “open-eyed”. The open-eyed have developed organizations to do so (Order of the White Lotus, so their focus isn’t just helping the Avatar).

The vessels (unless they’re the Avatar) are not simply able to be the spirits, interact with them, etc. whenever they want. The spirits will approach them, interact, and work through them as necessary for their concerns. This includes manipulating the elements to interact, pulling them into the spirit world for protection/transport, healing, energybending, and occasionally using their bodies for manifestation like what we see in the Northern Water Tribe with Aang and La, although this would be through a different person, because the spirits wouldn’t necessarily need the Avatar to manifest when they have a vessel present.

Since the spirits I’m portraying are typically each tied to one element, each vessel will have elevated bending, perhaps even beyond their canon capabilities. Some will become benders when they wouldn’t have, some will discover new arts, and some relearn skills that haven’t been used since ancient times.

Basically, this AU allows me to manipulate the world to cause a couple of specific things: Zuko not having all of the trauma of his childhood (Though he still has some), Yue being a little less sedentary, Sokka being more open to spirits and bending and even closer to Katara, who gets even more badass, Toph having better role models in her childhood (still sneaks out to the badgermoles and Earth Rumble), and Aang learning the elements from some of the original masters of them, and having some more help in the Spirit World.


	2. World Building II: Elemental Spirit Natures

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter details the natures, domains, and relationships of the major elemental spirits seen in this series. Raava isn't included because there's already a good amount of background on her, given that she's the Avatar Spirit.

The spirits are all very different in this world. Each has their own distinct traits that come across in how they treat their vessels and their siblings. Here’s a basic rundown.

Agni  : The Sun Spirit. Patron of firebenders, Father of dragons, Giver of Life. Tui’s Brother. Takes Zuko as a vessel. He cares for his children and vessels, even when they fall out of his favor. However, when they start tipping the balance, that starts to change. Much of the ceremonial flames used in the Fire Nation were directly given by him, and as such carry a potency of spirit that mirrors his. Given his nature as the Sun Spirit and the Giver of Life, his easiest influence over hist vessel is contact through flame and movement through the Spirit Realm. Sometimes considered a brother to Pavan, sometimes not. (Surya, although he is the Sun God in Hindu mythology, will not be mentioned here as his influences have been combined with Agni's)

Tui : The Moon Spirit. One of the Patrons of waterbenders, La’s lover and complement, Maker of Time. Agni’s Brother. Takes Yue as a vessel. Has a different influence over the Physical realm than Agni, because while Agni normally carries the Sun, Tui has both the Moon and his koi form. Guides his people from afar normally, and holds La in check. Tui blesses all of the Spirit Water in the Northern Water Tribe, and is their patron of healing and spirit bending. Given his nature as the Patron of Healing and Maker of Time, Tui’s easiest influence over his vessel is contact through Spirit Water and visions of their lifetime, past or potential future.

La : The Ocean Spirit. The other Patron of waterbenders, Tui’s lover and complement, Dealer of Vengeance and Compassion. Sister of Bhoomi. Takes Katara as a vessel. Uses the Ocean and her koi form. She’s the vengeful ocean goddess of this universe, and is respected, if not feared by the majority of the world. Held in check by Tui. She is more a patron of the Southern Water Tribe, while Tui takes the North, and they, along with Bhoomi, bless the Swamp. The Southern Water Tribe is smaller, has more sea travel, and deals in darker styles of bending than the North. She’s the patron of bloodbending and combat waterbending. Given her nature as the Dealer of Vengeance and the Patron of Bloodbending, La’s easiest influence over her vessel is direct possession and the pulling of heartstrings.

Bhoomi: Old goddess of the Earth, the All-Mother, La’s sister. Also technically the Mother of badgermoles, but she’s the All-Mother, so it’s kind of a moot point. Known as the Giver of Shelter and the Peaceful One. Doesn’t take vessels because she already has too much to do; she passed that responsibility off to the lesser Earth spirits Oma & Shu. Patron of the Earth Kingdom, but has responsibility to the Swamp and the rest of the Earth as well.

Oma & Shu : Ancient Spirits of Earth, around not long after the First Avatar, but much younger than the Primordial Spirits. Patrons of Earthbending, Lovers, Patrons of Love and the Home. Take Toph Beifong as their vessel. Prayed to in shrines all across the Earth Kingdom. Take vessels relatively often, and reintroduce elements of earthbending that allow the style to evolve and grow quickly. Given their nature as humans given spiritual form, their easiest influence over their vessel is actual presence and guidance in their lives.

Pavan  : The Wind Spirit. Patron of Airbenders, Father of air bison, Giver of Freedom and Enlightenment. Also known as the Purifier of Evils. Took Monk Gyatso as a vessel. Prayed to by the Air Nomads, not as a singular spirit, but as one among many. Blesses fewer of his people, but each is more individually powerful and spiritually enlightened. Prefers to let his vessels come to their own conclusions and act for themselves, but will influence them through other spirits like _kamaitachi_. Sometimes considered a brother to Agni, sometimes not.


	3. Music

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This world-building chapter resulted from me falling into a research tangent after remembering that every road trip I have ever been on has been accompanied by music, whether we were listening to it or producing it. This chapter will be added to as characters pop up and join the Gaang.

This series is going to consider some things we don’t always see, like what they did while they traveled on Appa. For this reason, I’m including an element that I’ve had throughout my life: music, especially vocal and a capella that they would sing while riding an air bison and a dragon together. Sometimes this will be solo, sometimes they’ll figure out the harmonies to something together and just improvise on a common song. My siblings and I still do this, and it’s always fun to pass the time, even if you’re not a great singer. This will be added to as characters are introduced and brought into the ongoing road trip.

Aang: Songs of prayer he learned with the Air Nomads, Old folk songs he picked up while traveling, etc. These are simple melodies with meaningful lyrics as well as stories in song form. This differs from traditional Tibetan music in that much of their music comes from Buddhist chanting underscored with the use of singing bowls. Since I’m shamelessly inserting elements of my own culture with Aang’s given my heritage in India, and also due to the fact that I made the Air Nomads polytheistic, their music is more like mantras and slokas as well as longer bhajans along with mythology-based songs. I’m not ascribing it to either Carnatic or Hindustani music, but I think there would also be some descriptions of life and travel that would differ in style depending on the Air Temple you went to. It does make Aang's situation even sadder, given that he's losing not only the people but also the elements of culture that were never noted down given that they were based on oral tradition and some things can only be taught person to person rather than from books and documentation. He’s got training, but it’s limited by his age and the fact that while he was a monk he was also a child prodigy airbender and went out on adventures literally all the time. Given that he’s 100 years out of date, the rest of the Gaang probably hasn’t heard of the songs he sings, except for like one song that Zuko/Sokka knows randomly from either ghosts or court training, but they’re willing to learn to keep his knowledge and culture afloat with him.

Katara: Traditional storytelling music. This is based on research I’ve done into Inuit music. This is made up of _recitative-like_ _singing, complex rhythmic organization, relatively small melodic range averaging ab_ _out a sixth, prominence of major thirds and minor seconds melodically, with undulating melodic movement_ _._ I’d love to learn more about Inuit throat-singing and maybe include it, but I don’t think I have the proper expertise to truly do it justice. The most I would ever include on it would be a description of Katara and Yue doing a vocal game, given that the practice of _katajjaq_ is as competitive song between two women using overtone singing. Here’s a brief description from my research: _When competing, two women stand face-to-face and sing using a complex method of following each other, thus that one voice hits a strong accent while the other hits a weak, melding the two voices into a nearly indistinguishable single sound. They repeat brief motifs at staggered intervals, often_[ _i_](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sound_mimesis_in_various_cultures) _mitating natural sounds, like those of geese, caribou or other wildlife, until one runs out of breath, trips over her own tongue, or begins laughing, and the contest is then over._ Overall, the Water Tribe siblings have learned their cultural music and probably instruments that go with it, but bringing instrumentation while traveling is difficult, so the focus will be vocal for now.

Sokka: Whatever he’s picked up from the spirits passing on, including folk songs, court music from 600 years ago, old travel music (earworms like Secret Tunnel), etc., along with the traditional music he learned alongside Katara.

Zuko: I would say that Zuko probably has the most experience with music theory in terms of notation and terminology, given that he grew up in a royal court and he’s good at pretty much everything except socializing, and his mom was an actress and he’s a dramatic theater nerd so he’s bound to have learned some theatrical music as well. The styles I would say he learned, to the best of my knowledge of traditional Japanese music, are _saibara,_ or traditional vocal court music, _kigaku,_ or instrumental court music, and _kabuki,_ which is a type of Japanese theatre known for its highly stylized dancing and singing as well as the elaborate make-up worn by the predominately all-male cast. I just think it would be hilarious, because when you think about it, that’s just so Zuko. Given that we know he plays the tsungi horn, which isn’t based on any Japanese instrument but instead the sound of the trombone combined with the duduk (an Armenian double-reed instrument) and shaped like a sousaphone crossed with a french horn, his instrumental learning would definitely be different from actual traditional music, especially as the tsungi horn doesn’t really have an equivalent in traditional Japanese music that I could find, at the very least. Anyway, Zuko’s a theater nerd and also a band kid, but his vocal training in _saibara_ comprises of short songs intended to be descriptions of scenes, with a repertoire of about 400 songs. _Leaves from the Vine,_ for me, falls into this category. This is where Aang or Sokka might have randomly picked something up, as I headcanon that the Fire Nation shifted away from this styling as they moved into more imperialistic pursuits and thus picked up more foreign music, but the 112-year old Air Nomad/Avatar or the guy who talks to ghosts might have heard it at some point.


End file.
